Springfield daily republic. [volume] (Springfield, O. [Ohio]) 1887-1888, 1887-11-17
CHEAP CLOTHING.
LIVES OF WOMEN WORN OUT on
READY MADE SUITS.

READY MADE SUITS.
wha. 1t Costs to Put Bargain" Price
Marks on Wearing Appsrel-DanEers
Of the ..slop Shop Trade-A business
Needing Ventilation.
The slop shop is the biggest thing In the
cheap clothing trade, and the slop shop keep
ers are the hardest taskmasters OF the poor
slaves Of the metropolis. Competition in the
retail clothing business has brought this con-
dition of things about Besides, the whole
system on which the manufacture Of cheap
clothing is carried on is as bad as it can be,
and its continuance is a menace to public
health and danger to the general welfare OF
tho community beside which the much
talked of tenement house manufacture OF
cigars is nothing.
There are comparatively few clothing fac
tories in New York. Mos: of what are called
such are simply shops where the cloth Is cut
Z then goes, each sort Of garment separately.
to the ''tailors,n so called, who have their
shops all over the city, but chiefly In the most
dcnsely populated tenement house districts
and in the very slums. One tailor will take
out hundreds or thousands of pairs Of panta-
looms in a week, another carries off the coats,
and the vests so somewhere else. II these
men or women have any shops at all they are
SIMPLY their living rooms in the tenements,
where they hire girls to come for from moth
ing to few dollars a week and work at sew
ing machines making up the garments. In
many instances men instead Of girls are hired,
especially on heavy work, but in either case
the people are crowded as closely as the ma
hines can be put together, often four or five
n one small room where all the household
ives and all the domestic work is carried ca.
In these places reeking with all the vile
odors of the tenements, with dirty chill
dren crawling over the filthy floors, play
ing among them by day and sleeping upon
them at night, in an atmosphere, in short, of
dirt, disease and death, the garments are
finally made up They may be 'fnished"-
that is, have the buttons put on and the other
hand sewing done-in the same place, or this
work may be farmcd out to still more abject
slaves than those who toll over tho machines
to women who are prevented by invalid
husbands. young children, or other reasons
from leaving their homes, and who are there
fore obliged to take up for their work what
ever pittance the slop shop barons will dole
out to them, and trust to charity for enough
more to stave Off starvation. In the bar
ren rooms of these lowest Of slaves
the garments have a chance to get
a new variety of odors and disease
germs. Then they 60, most likely, to the
buttonhole factory, where they touch shoui
ders with similar lots from dozens of other
tenement houss shops, and when their own
odors and &c. ms have thus been amalga
mated with the odors and germs Of all the
tenements for half n mile around, they 60
back to the original slop shop, and thence in
the course of time to the alleged manufac-
turer who sells them to q wholesaler, maybe
from whom they go TO the retailer, and after
all these different hands have taken their
toll the general public is invited to come IL
and look at the wonderful bargains in cloth
ing.
Often they are wonderful bargains indeed,
in spite Of the numerous profits that have
been made off Of them; but if they are cheap
it rs because women have turned their sinews
iplo thread and their blood into sewing ma
caine oil in the making Of them They are
aired and funigated, and cleansed, maybe,
before they are sold, but a man in the bust
ness says: If people knew where those
clothes have been they would never buy
hem"
Philip Leidesdorir has been In business for
eighteen years. His brother is with him now,
and they have a buttonhole factory. They
take the work after those who get it from tn
manufacturers have made it up and put in
he buttonholcs for SO much q hundred
'sThis tenement houso work i" he says, ''is
the ruin of the clothing business, and worse
yet, its tho ruin of those that work at it.
Some day people will wake up to what this
cheap clothing business means. Go into
some of these teuements and you'll find in
Some OF the little rooms a whole family iv-
ing, and three or four girls working at ma
chimes all day. They take the goods from
the tailor's and make them up in the rooms
where they cook and sleep. Why, they use
the clothes for bedding, even If people
could see once the vie holes in which the
clothing is made up they'd never buy any
any Of it. wish they could see some of ii
when It comes here to have the buttonholes
put in 1t gets aired ard cleaned before it Is
put up for sale
"The way these people do is to get young
girls to come and learn the business They
make them work six weeks for nothing, Or,
mario, s. a week for their work, and they
PACK Just as many Of them rs they can get
into one room, along with the children and
the cooking and all the rest. That way they
make a little money for themselves at tho
expense of the girls, but it don't do them
much good, for pretty quick the manufac-
turer grirds down the price another peg,
and the more they grind the girls the more
tho manufacturer Griuds them. until nobody
is making more than bare living. The
people that take the work out in the country
to DO are pretty near as bad as the tenement
house people for prices, but, of course, they're
-. -, T., 81.
be good deal higher in the city. New
York Is the worst city in the country for |
sowing women. In Philadelphia, even, they
Pay them GOOD deal better. Its all on ac-
count OF this tenement house work, and it'll
never be any better till they pass laws m2k-
ics i Illegal for moro than ono machine to
be put il al ordinary living room
There's another thing, said David LeideS- |
Gor!T, q brother, ''and if cholera or any such |
disease ever gets a start in this city people |
Will end it out mighty quick. These tene-
ment Eouse factories would spread the dis |
ease through tho whole country. Tvcaiwcys /,
scii that if cholera ever got a start in New |
York I'd drop this business and get out right |
away, and I'd do it, too. They have board !
Of health and laws enough here, but I've /
never been in q city Yet, and I've been all
over the world, where they allowed such I
things ns they do here Only last winter, at
place in a street right near here, the CHI /
dren in family were sick of smallpox in the |
same room where the clothing was being ]
made up and sent out every day. These peo- |
pie don't have any more regard for the laws /
or for other peoples health than they do for /
their own health, and if you have ever been .
in any of the holes where they live and wor,. /
you know how little that is This whole .
business Of to manufacture of cheap clothin. /
needs o showing up"-New York Sun
The Husbands Position.
The husband who chooses to make the ef |
fort viii find that when he accoris to lis |
wife full acknowledgment Of her individu-
nlitY. and accustnnls her throuch all tn.